The North Korean regime fired projectiles, presumably ballistic missiles, on Sunday March 29 for the fourth time this month, when all the attention of the international community is focused on the fight against Coronavirus pandemic.
Sunday's shots were fired in the area of the port city of Wonsan, on the east coast, and in the direction of the Sea of Japan, or East Sea according to the Korean appellation.
"Such a military action by North Korea is extremely inappropriate at a time when the whole world is in difficulty because of the Covid-19 pandemic," the South Korean Joint Staff then observed in a press release, stating that the projectiles appeared to be ballistic missiles.
The Japanese Ministry of Defense also said they looked like "ballistic missiles" and said they did not fall into Japanese waters or into Japan's exclusive maritime economic zone.
North Korea, an atomic bomb country, made no comment on the launches. Pyongyang had claimed that the three series of shots fired in March towards the Sea of Japan were all tests of "long-range artillery".
Last week, the regime led by Kim Jong-un said it had tested a new "guided tactical weapon" where Seoul had seen two short-range ballistic missiles.
These tests come against a backdrop of total diplomatic deadlock between North Korea and the United States on the nuclear dossier, and at the moment when Washington has just offered aid to Pyongyang to fight the new coronavirus.
Letter from Donald Trump
North Korea is under multiple sanctions from the United Nations Security Council to force it to give up its banned nuclear and ballistic programs.
In the aftermath of last week's shootings, northern media announced that leader Kim Jong-un had received a letter from U.S. President Donald Trump detailing a plan to improve bilateral relations. What White House officials confirmed.
The North Korean press cited in particular Kim Jong Un's sister and adviser, Kim Yo Jong, who warned that the good personal relationship between the latter and Donald Trump would not be enough to relaunch relations.
No case of coronavirus announced
In the letter, the American president "explained his plan to propel relations between the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and the United States and expressed his intention to lend assistance in the fight against the epidemics", obviously a reference to the Covid -19, according to a press release issued by KCNA.
North Korea is one of the rare countries in the world not to have announced a case of contamination on its soil, even if in the South, many are convinced that the North is affected.
Many experts believe that the pandemic which has already killed more than 30,000 people in the world could prove catastrophic in the North, given the weakness of its health system.
Sunday's shootings were aimed at showing that the country continues to function normally, in spite of the pandemic which affects the world, estimated Kim Dong-yub, researcher at the Institute for the Studies in the Far East, based in Seoul .
Pyongyang has been multiplying arms tests since November in the absence of progress in the negotiations by which Washington hopes to make it abandon its nuclear program.
These discussions have stalled since the fiasco of the second summit between Donald Trump and the North Korean leader, in February 2019 in Hanoi, and this despite a very symbolic meeting between the two men in June in the demilitarized zone which divides the peninsula.
North Korea is gradually refining its military capabilities, analysts said, despite sanctions and convictions.
With AFP
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